RT Journal
T1 THe rescue of the republic—an object lesson in "purposeless" research
JF Journal of the American Medical Association
JO Journal of the American Medical Association
YR 1909
FD January 30
VO LII
IS 5
SP 390
OP 390
DO 10.1001/jama.1909.02540310050010
UL http://dx.doi.org/10.1001/jama.1909.02540310050010
AB A large number of people fail to appreciate the enormous value to medical science, from a practical viewpoint, of "mere laboratory work," in the more abstruse problems of physiology, pathology, general biology, etc. They seem to demand that all investigation should be undertaken with a well-defined application in view. They are impatient of investigations whose sole object is to transfer everything possible from the region of the unknown to that of the known. Yet but for this seemingly aimless work performed by the pioneers of medical science in laboratory experimentation many of the triumphs of applied medicine would be impossible. It is well, therefore, to emphasize the object lesson in this direction so recently afforded by the application of similar laboratory work in the physical sciences, through wireless telegraphy, in the rescue of almost the entire personnel on board the ocean liner, the Republic. The world just now is ringing